A Primal Lifestyle Bali, Day 9

Todays journey took me into hills of Bali and one of my all time favourite villages, the traditional village of Ubud. This village is a gem. It’s architecture, temples and forests, the rice terrace, lovely shops, café’s and resorts are wonderful. Ubud is a unique and inspiring place. As soon as you arrive you feel a sensation of peace, tranquillity and happiness.

Rice Terraces:

I wanted to explore the famous Rice Terraces in Ubud, for two reasons. I was told the trek and scenery are beautiful, and I wanted to take a look at the actual rice paddies and the amount of water they are using to grow this grain.

The night prior to my trip here, I saw a documentary on CNN that was talking about irrigation of vineyards and rice paddies and how to reduce the senseless amounts of water pumped into these two crops alone. This is when I learnt that rice farming accounts for 1/3 of the Worlds daily water consumption!

Considering what low nutrient value rice has and the Worlds chronic water shortage, I was quite shocked to learn this. Sure, rice is a cheap food source for millions of people and it’s a cultural custom to consumer rice in many countries with almost every meal. However, this doesn’t change the fact that rice is a grain and contributes to many health problems people are facing today. It’s an unnecessary grain and wastes a lot of water on top.

There are ways to reduce the way water is wasted in rice farming, but tradition calls for the paddies to be constantly under water, when in fact this is not required to grow the crop.

I’m going to start to raise awareness regarding this problem and will try my best to re-educate the farmers and get them to use less water.

Impromptu Step Sprint Session:

On the way to the rice terraces I came across the most marvellous set of steps, which led us down to the beginning of the rice terrace trek. This made my day. I knew immediately what I would be doing on the way back – sprinting the steps. As you all know by now I love steps as they give you a huge variety of exercise possibilities.

We completed our rice terrace trek and arrived back at the steps – maybe 200 or so and very steep as you can see. I knocked out 4 maximum power step sprints, lasting 20 – 25 seconds each time. Total time with warm up and warm down spent was about 25 minutes.

Wow this was a hard set of sprints. Sprinting steps this steep is obviously much harder than sprinting on the flat and you have the added difficulty of having to concentrate on actually bounding up these steep steps without tripping.

I threw in a few incline push-ups for extra fun and to pump up the chest and shoulder muscles. Not that you need to do that, I just felt like it so I did it. I did what came to mind and what felt good!

What a wonderful workout this was!

Made Ada Woodcarving Master:

I ended this wonderful day by visiting the most incredible woodcarving master – Made Ade – in Ubud. Made is World famous for his incredible woodcarvings. Some of his creations are 20ft tall. The detail and beauty of this art is stunning. Mr Made shared with me that one of these pieces takes around 1 – 2 years to finish. Quite something. An incredibly long time, thousands of hours, sweat, patience and love go into each unique piece.

When in Bali you must visit Ubud and you definitely must visit Made Ade’s Gallery.

The Message:

When traveling make an effort to visit cultural sites and become immersed in the countries culture and traditions. This will bring you much closer to the people and will give you greater satisfaction and beautiful memories.

Exercise intuitively wherever and whenever you feel like it. Be that if you are out trekking, walking, or viewing temples. Whatever, it doesn’t matter and you don’t have to feel silly about it.

This is the spice of life and this will bring you so such joy. Make sure you always have a set of workout clothes with you and you are ready to workout at anytime. This keeps your mind free and your day less planned/structured.